Technology's Impact on Spiritual Formation

The second literature category was spiritual formation. Specifically, I looked at technology's impact on spiritual formation in the 21st century. In this post, I will explore at two specific challenges that emerged at this intersection of faith and technology: busyness and worry.

As mentioned in a previous post, technology has simply amplified the number of "voices" that are shouting for our attention and affections through an endless stream of tweets, updates, pings, and notifications. These things can fill the empty spaces of our lives and leaves us feeling scattered, fragmented, exhausted. The problems associated with spiritual busyness and worry is rooted in these things... feeling scattered, being fragmented, and being paralyzed by exhaustion to change.

Henri Nouwen in his book "Making All Things New" stated that that we live within a strange reality in which we are "filled yet unfulfilled" as well as "busy and bored at the same time." Technological advances in the 21st century have only exasperated these feelings. Nouwen was a very important dialogue partner throughout my dissertation (and spiritual life) when he speaks prophetically about the need for a deep spiritual life. He looked at Jesus’ words in Matthew 6:31-33 for answers to the challenges that busyness and worrying pose to the spiritual life:

“31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (NIV)

He identified "worry" as being normative in the 21st century and that a life without worries seemed not only impossible but undesirable. Nouwen pointed out that “worrying” had become a sort of badge of honor or worse, a sign of godliness and responsibility in our current cultural context. He rightly noted, “We have a suspicion that to be carefree is unrealistic and worse dangerous. Our worries motivate us to work hard, to prepare ourselves for the future, and to arm ourselves against impending threats” (Nouwen, "Making All Things New" Kindle Location 63).

Busyness and worry combined with technological advances have the potential to be a lethal combination in people's spiritual and personal lives. The Triple Revolution of the Internet, social media networks, and mobile devices have created the problem of "always being on" in an "always on" world. The spiritual rhythms that are foundational to spiritual formation can become disjointed and lost within a high-tech cultural context that Manuel Castells describes as a "space of flows" and one that is marked by "timeless time." This tension, that is found at the intersection of faith and technology, was the primary pastoral motivation behind my research and studies.

There is hope. Spiritual formation can (and should) be re-envisioned with technological problems and possibilities in mind. Futurist John Naisbitt presented a very helpful paradigm that served as an important framework for my research. He theorized that in a world of technology, people would long for personal human contact. He labeled this tension "high tech and high touch." This tension served as a guide as well as a goal in my research. How can we leverage high tech ideas with a high touch desire to connect with one another and with God?

The good news is that existing research affirms this "high tech and high touch" relationship. Lee Rainie and Barry Wellman argued that the Internet and mobile devices did not lure people away from interpersonal contact (which is often the popular narrative of anti-social people sitting next to each other but staring at their smartphones) but instead increased their relational circles. Barry Wellman, in another study with Hua Wang, found that heavy Internet users from 2002 to 2007 showed an increase of more than one-third in the number of friends seen in person on a weekly basis (Hua Wang and Barry Wellman, “Social Connectivity in America,” American Behavioral Scientist 53, no. 8 (2010): 1148– 1169). It is important to note that it is not an incorrect observation to point out the pitfalls of two people sitting at a table interacting with their phones and not each other (for example, families should ban smartphones at the dinner table) but it also helpful to note, in light of the research, that there is highly likelihood that these two people are interacting with people within their social media networks via these technology mediated devices.

In the next posts, I will explore how some thought leaders have already re-envisioned spiritual formation with the technological cultural changes in mind. I am grateful for their work and look forward to sharing some that were inspiring to me.